


A Million Stars

by kaesaria



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, HYDRA Trash Party adjacent, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Insomnia, M/M, Misunderstandings, Rape Aftermath, Rape Recovery, Secrets, Sleeping Together, no on-screen rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-14
Updated: 2016-11-14
Packaged: 2018-08-30 01:37:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8513722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaesaria/pseuds/kaesaria
Summary: Bucky can't let the words out. Tony can't hold them back. Apathy, anger and insomnia: the road to recovery is anything but uncluttered. The boys have to find a way through traumas both near and distant, and Steve has to step back and let them... no matter how hard that is._____Written in response to a prompt on the trashmeme.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Миллион звезд](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9671903) by [littledoctor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/littledoctor/pseuds/littledoctor), [WTF_Avengers_2017](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WTF_Avengers_2017/pseuds/WTF_Avengers_2017)



> **Be sure to check out Caz's[artwork](http://cazdraws.tumblr.com/post/153190358456/bucky-cant-let-the-words-out-tony-cant-hold) for this story! IT IS SO GORGEOUS OMG.**
> 
> A huge thank you to my wonderful betas and cheerleaders, [Lanidzac](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lanidzac), [Tipsy_Kitty](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Tipsy_Kitty/pseuds/Tipsy_Kitty), [potofsoup](http://archiveofourown.org/users/potofsoup/pseuds/potofsoup), and [deerna](http://archiveofourown.org/users/deerna/pseuds/deerna), for holding my hand through the (omg) _months_ it took to get this thing finished. I couldn't have done it without all your support  & feedback!!
> 
>  **NOTE:** I'm tagging this as warning: rape/non-con just to be safe, but there's no on-screen rape (or any sex all all) in this story. The pairing is technically Stony but the whole story is told from Bucky’s POV, mostly through interactions between Bucky  & Tony.

“He wants me to talk about it,” Stark says, right before pouring the rest of the liquor down his throat. Bucky hasn’t really been keeping track, but it’s not Stark’s first drink of the night. Or his third, or his fourth.

“He just won’t leave it the fuck alone. Keeps telling me to share my feelings, tell him what he can do to help, blah blah blah.” Stark pauses to pour himself another finger or two of whiskey. The bottle probably cost more than the house Bucky had grown up in.

“What a bunch of bullshit, am I right or am I right?” His voice is starting to slur a little, vowels rolling together and consonants blurring. “If I knew what he could do to help—if I could figure out anything that _would_ help, I wouldn’t be in this mess.”

Bucky looks over at him, finally.

Stark is pitched forward on the armchair, elbows braced on his knees and shoulders hunched. When he looks up, his eyes are bloodshot, vacant. His face is aimed in Bucky’s direction, to where he’s sitting on the couch at an angle from Stark’s chair. But Stark’s gaze is focused further out, at a place on the wall behind Bucky—or past it, maybe.

“He won’t fuck me, either.”

Bucky shifts a little at that, caught somewhere between apathetic and uncomfortable. He’s not a goddamn marriage counselor, and Stark’s got more than a few therapists on the payroll. Bucky doesn’t have the energy to deal with this right now. Or ever.

He’s about to say as much—in a slightly more diplomatic way, if he can muster the tact—but Stark interrupts him. For a guy who supposedly doesn’t want to talk, he sure has a lot to say.

“I told him it was fine, you know? That I wanted it—that I _want_ it. With him.” Stark’s knuckles are bloodless under the tension of his hold on the glass. “I told him that I’m not damaged, or traumatized, or whatever’s going on in his head. Whatever he thinks I am or should be or whatever the fuck.”

The tumbler shakes. The movement makes tiny ripples flutter across the surface of the whiskey. Stark doesn’t seem aware; he’s still staring at that distant place behind Bucky.

“He doesn’t understand.” Bucky’s surprised at the sound of his own voice. He swallows, decides to go on anyway. “They never do. That’s—a good thing.”

When he glances up again, Stark is watching him. Really looking at _him_ , now, like he’s seeing Bucky for the first time since he plopped on the armchair a half hour ago, whiskey glass glued to his hand. He looks surprised, too. Kind of shocked, actually, as if the coffee table had suddenly grown a mouth and started talking back to him.

“Yeah,” Stark says, after a second. His voice is quieter now, though it hadn’t been loud before. “Yeah. A good thing.”

After that, Stark finishes his drink in silence.

Bucky watches as he leaves, as he heads toward the elevator that will take him up to Steve’s bed. Stark’s steps are a slow shuffle, so different from the blustering swagger of his walk around the rest of them.

 

* * *

 

Bucky’s still sitting on the couch when the footsteps come towards him, a few hours later. He jerks his head up: it’s Steve—just _Steve_ , no one else—coming down for his pre-run power snack. Bucky wills away the ice-cold rush of adrenaline, forces his body to relax.

Steve waves at Bucky on his way to the counter, where he sets himself up with a box of corn flakes. He pours almost a whole carton of milk into his gigantic bowl before settling down at the island. Bucky makes his way over and pulls out a bowl for himself. They sit in companionable silence for awhile, both munching on cereal.

Bucky finishes his first. He watches Steve make his way through the rest of his food with the single-minded focus of a child raised during the Depression. Steve’s face has always been an open book, easy to read, and he never tries to hide anything from Bucky, anyway.

His eyes have a tired haze now, though he’s always been a morning person: bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at inhuman hours of the morning, while Bucky would still be growling into his first cup of watery coffee. Steve’s face is paler than it should be, and the pained tightness around his mouth tugs at Bucky’s heart.

“How are you holding up?” he has to ask, finally.

Blue eyes snap up from the bowl to meet Bucky’s, steady and piercing. “What?” then, “I’m fine,” reflexively. Bucky holds Steve’s gaze until it darts away, looking toward the elevator that leads up to his and Stark’s bedroom.

Steve flushes a little when he realizes that he’s been caught at it. “I’m _fine_ ,” he repeats, mulish.

Bucky looks away first, this time. He glances down at his left hand, to where it’s resting at the edge of the granite counter. When he taps his fingers against the cold stone, it makes a hollow, clinking sound.

“It’s just—.” Steve takes a breath. “He won’t come to bed when I do, anymore. Or, he will, then—. We always get into a, a thing.” Steve reddens again, stares down at his empty bowl.

“We get into a fight. We keep _fighting_ , no matter how much I try not to. About—I don’t know, stupid things.” He falls silent for a second, still staring into the dregs of sugary milk. When he starts talking again, his voice is lower. “And then he leaves, and he doesn’t come back until I’m asleep. If at all. I don’t know if he’s sleeping at all, most nights.”

Bucky nods, slow. He understands the sick allure of insomnia. It’s draining—painful, even—to fight sleep night after night. But it’s a hell of a lot better than the helpless terror of nightmares.

“Hey, how’s _your_ sleep, Buck?” Steve is watching him now, anxious concern all over his open face. “I used to be the first one up every morning, but now you’re always down here before me...”

“I think I’ve had enough sleep for a lifetime.” Bucky lets the corner of his mouth crook up, a deflection.

More to the point, he’s had more than enough helpless terror for a lifetime—but he doesn’t want to get into all that. It’s too early, and Bucky’s too fucking tired. It works, anyway, and Steve’s expression immediately changes from guilt to anger: he’s thinking about HYDRA now, instead of poking at Bucky’s tenuous walls.

“So, trouble in paradise, huh?” Bucky asks, to shift the subject back to safer waters.

Steve is quiet for a long moment. Then, in rush, “He has these godawful dreams. And—he gets all panicked when I try to touch him. To wake him up, I mean.” Steve’s voice drops again, a confessional hush. “So I don’t, anymore. I just lie there and listen to his nightmares.”

He pauses, looks down at his bowl before continuing. “He keeps talking about _sand_. Other stuff too, but it always comes back to muttering about sand.” His tone has a bewildered edge. “It doesn’t make any sense. He wasn’t anywhere near a desert or a beach. When—when they had him, I mean. I checked.”

Steve shifts his gaze away again. His voice is soft, miserable as he wonders out loud, “Why sand, of all things? It doesn’t make sense. None of it makes any sense.”

They sit in silence for a while, then Steve looks up, apologetic. “I’m sorry, Buck. This isn’t your—. It shouldn’t have to be your problem.” He squares his shoulders, takes back the weight of the world.

“I’ll take care of it,” he says, finally. “I’ll take care of him.”

Bucky’s not sure which one of them he’s trying to assure.

 

* * *

 

“Here’s the thing.” Stark stops, stares into space again.

The silence goes on for long enough that Bucky’s pretty sure he’s lost his train of thought, that he won’t speak again. But Stark’s not Stark if he’s not talking.

“The thing is, they didn’t hurt me, not really.” Stark is rubbing at the center of his chest, an absent-minded gesture that Bucky has noticed him doing a lot lately. He’s staring at his drink, which sits on the coffee table next to one that he’d poured for Bucky.

Bucky hasn’t touched it; he’s got no use for alcohol. He doesn’t have much use for Stark, either, but the guy doesn’t seem to be catching the hint.

Apparently, he’s decided that this is a thing they do every night, now: sit together in the common area in the middle of the night, when the rest of the Tower is silent with the sleep that eludes them. He hasn’t turned on the light, anyway, so Bucky doesn’t care enough to leave.

“It wasn’t the point.” Stark makes a dismissive wave with his hand, as if that’s supposed to mean something to Bucky. “Hurting me, I mean. That wasn’t the point. They were just—bored. The guys guarding me. They were looking for ways to pass the time. I just—I don’t think anyone told them not to, so they figured what the hell.”

“Secondary function.”

It’s out before Bucky’s brain catches up with his mouth. He stiffens as soon as the words hit the air—but Stark doesn’t react the way Bucky expects. Instead, he laughs: a short, incongruous sound. It’s enough to shock Bucky back into relaxing, a little.

“No mincing words with you, Deadshot.” Stark runs a hand over his face. “ _Secondary function_. Jesus.”

He takes another sip of his drink, then sets it carefully down in the exact same place he’d picked it up. It’s going to leave a condensation mark on the thousand-dollar wood slab that makes up the top of the coffee table.

“But yeah, that’s exactly right. You always hit your target center mass. That’s why I like you, Barnes.” The words roll off of Stark’s tongue as if it’s nothing at all to like a guy who’d murdered his parents and countless hundreds of others. It sends another jolt of shock through Bucky, but Stark doesn’t react.

“They didn’t touch me at all for the first few days.” Stark keeps his eyes on the table as he goes on. “They had me locked up in some—I think it was a motel room. Dingy wallpaper and dirty covers on a lumpy mattress. They brought me takeout. Chinese, burgers, whatever. Always in plastic bags.”

Stark wipes at his mouth with the back of his hand, an unconscious gesture, before continuing. “It was a good excuse to eat greasy food, anyway. No TV, no internet, obviously. I was bored out of my mind.” He pauses for a second before going on. “Part of me was kind of—glad, almost, the first time the guy came in. Someone to talk to, at least. Though I figured he probably wouldn’t talk back much.”

Stark is sitting next to him on the couch tonight. Bucky feels a sudden urge to shift away, or at least tell him to shut up and go to bed, but he can’t seem to muster the energy to do either.

Stark starts talking again before he can make up his mind. “That’s not really an issue for me, though. I can always hold up both sides of a conversation, no problem.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed.”

Stark grins, lifts the glass at him in salute. Bucky watches him finish his drink and pour himself another. It’s awhile before Stark talks again. In the heavy silence, Bucky counts the number of exits, calculates extraction trajectories.

“They handcuffed me to the bed, at first,” Stark continues, finally. “So I wouldn’t ‘hurt myself struggling.’“ He shrugs a little, adds, “They could have saved themselves the effort—I wasn’t going to fight them. I learned that lesson the first time around.”

There was nothing explicit in the old reports about Afghanistan, but Bucky knows how to read between the lines, how to see the tells. The tight, jittery exhaustion crawling just under the surface of Stark’s shuttered face is something he’s all too familiar with, himself.

“It only took a couple days for them to figure out that I wasn’t going to give them any trouble. After that, they didn’t bother with the handcuffs.” Stark is rubbing at his wrist, absently, his left hand circled around the right.

“So it’s goddamn irritating how everyone kept making a big ass deal about the—. You know, the marks there.” Stark is leaning on his elbows again, staring at his wrists as if the scrapes were still there. They had disappeared within days.

Surface marks never last; it’s the scars on the inside that never fade.

“It’s not like I was chained up for the whole three weeks. I barely had them on for a few hours, all said and told. I bruise easily, and the first guy was kind of vigorous.” Stark looks up, stares into the distance again. “I think he had a crush on me—he liked to come back for seconds.”

“Vigorous, huh? Sounds like fun.” Bucky was aiming for neutral, but his voice comes out sounding flat, almost rude. It jolts Stark back from—wherever he’d gone, anyway. He jerks his head a little, like he’s shaking something off, then straightens up enough to focus on Bucky again.

“It wasn’t like—he didn’t actually hurt me. None of them did. I made sure of that.” His voice is still even, matter of fact. He leans back on the couch and spreads his arm over the backrest, toward Bucky. They’re far enough apart that his hand doesn’t come anywhere close to touching.

“Anyway, it’s hard to give a decent blowjob when you’re handcuffed face down to a bed, you know?” Stark’s smile has a hard edge to it this time, lips pressed tight in challenge.

Bucky meets his gaze, smiles back, just as sharp. “Yeah,” he says, “I know.”

 

* * *

 

Bucky lands with a clatter right on top of a table of Clint’s vibranium-tipped arrows. He’d been training with Wanda, in the middle of a new exercise, when he suddenly felt the bubble of energy under him shift and _give_ —and he wasn’t launching toward the upper grappling bars anymore. A big fat nothing under his feet where Wanda’s red cloud was a second ago, and the ground coming up at him way too fast.

Bucky twists in time to make sure his left side takes most of the impact. He’s on his feet by the time the others rush over.

“Jeez, are you okay?” Sam wheezes, still out of breath. “Sorry, man, I should have been watching where I was going—”

He shakes off their concern with a shrug, a smile: it takes more than a fall to break Bucky.

By the time he reaches the elevator after, the adrenaline from the training room has worn off and the all-too-familiar fatigue is back, draped over his mind and body like a shroud. He hits the button for the basement lab. Stark needs to take a look at these new dents on the arm.

Bucky likes Stark’s workshop. It’s quiet, and there are always new weapons and things to play with. If he’s in the right mood, Stark might let him poke around the cars.

He’d managed to doze for a couple hours on the couch last night after Stark had left. It’s enough to keep him functional, but not enough to stave off the heavy haze of exhaustion that follows Bucky wherever he goes these days.

When he gets to the lab, Stark isn’t alone—Rhodes is with him, hands on his hips and looking critically down at his new legs. The sleek metallic supports wouldn’t be noticeable at all if Rhodes’ cuffs weren’t pushed up to reveal them.

They both glance up, surprised, when Bucky steps into the room. He’s about to say he’ll come back later, but Rhodes interrupts him—

“Perfect timing Barnes; I need a second opinion. What do you think?” Rhodes puts out his left leg. “Manly steel and chrome?” He shifts to display his other calf, where the leg support is painted the same color red as the Iron Man armor. “Or gaudy red-and-gold à la the only colors this blind fool can appreciate?”

“Hey, I have excellent taste. Here, catch.” Stark tosses something at him, a tablet with more designs, maybe. “It’s been universally noted and acclaimed.” Rhodes makes a face as he moves quickly to the side to catch the thing. His steps are completely natural, but Bucky sees the way Stark carefully tracks the movement. Anyone who didn’t already know would never suspect that Rhodes had been stuck in a wheelchair only a few months ago.

Bucky walks into the workshop. He puts his arm down on the metal worktable between them with a dull thump, metal plates whirring and locking into place as he flexes the arm. “I’m more of gunmetal gray kind of guy.” It’s impressive, they can’t deny it. Bucky smirks.

“Whoa there, Terminator,” Stark says. “Not all of us can rock the Soviet Menace look. I just want to set my buddy up with some flair. I try and try, but it’s like beating my head against a gauche wall. You can lead a man to style, but you can’t make him lose the drab.” Stark shakes his head in abject disappointment.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Rhodes rolls his eyes. “Forget both of you, I’m gonna go ask for a real man’s opinion. Or better yet—a real woman, with some taste. Widow’s in the gym, right?” He grins, turns to leave without waiting for an answer. “Catch you later, Barnes. Mr. Stank.”

Rhodes is out of earshot, glass doors sliding closed behind him, before Stark can get out his requisite rejoinder. He makes do with scowling at Rhodes’ hastily retreating back, but the effect is pretty much ruined by the fond look in his eyes.

Stark turns back to Bucky and drops the mask of focused, cheerful energy he’d worn while Rhodes was with them. Bucky can see the weariness in his eyes, the strain around his mouth. “What’s up, Barnes?” he asks.

Bucky shows him the dents, and Stark settles him at a workbench. Bucky stretches the arm out, lets the table take the weight of it off his body. He lets the fatigue roll over him, slow and heavy. No need to keep up the facade anymore.

“You honestly like the retro-Schwarzenegger look?” Stark’s tone is absent; he’s pulling up a new screen to scan the damage. “Because if you’re thinking of a change, we could pimp this thing out. I’m talking Battlestar Galactica, Cylon-of-the-future type stuff. Stealth and lethality, all in one sexy package.”

Bucky shrugs noncommittally; he doesn’t understand half of what Stark is saying.

He lets Stark’s light, tired prattle float over him, not really bothering to listen to the words. He’s starting to realize that just the act of talking is a kind of ablution for Stark. Bucky can’t begrudge him the release, even if it makes him a little jealous. Stark will let Bucky know if he needs an actual response. In the meantime, it’s enough to let the sound of Stark’s voice wash over him. It’s weirdly soothing, and Bucky will take what he can get.

Bucky is comfortably zoned out, almost asleep on his feet, when the workshop doors slide open silently. He stiffens a little as Steve comes in, smiling at the sight of them together. But Stark doesn’t notice—he’s bent over the arm, engrossed in whatever he’s doing, mouth still running nonstop.

Bucky lifts his head, opens his mouth a second too slow. Maybe if he’d been more alert, if he’d been with anyone else, if he wasn’t programmed to automatically think _do not engage_ at the sight of blond hair, of ice blue eyes, he would have said something in time. But as it is—

Steve moves toward Stark smoothly, unthinkingly. He wraps his arms around Stark from behind the same way Bucky has seen him do a hundred, a thousand times before, before everything—

And Stark jerks, wildly. He _recoils_ , face going white with terror—he twists his body around and away from Steve. His hip slams into the workbench with a resounding thud, hard enough to make the tools clatter against the metal surface.

Steve lets go immediately. He takes a mortified step back, another, palms going up in alarm.

For a second, there’s nothing but absolute ringing silence—nothing to listen to past Stark’s quiet, shaky gasps, nothing to distract from the animal panic in his eyes.

Then—Stark shifts, sheds his tension like a coat. He pushes himself back off the table as if nothing had happened. He tries to smile at Steve. It’s a jittery, awful thing to see.

“I’m sorry,” Steve croaks. “God, I’m so sorry, Tony, I shouldn’t have—”

“What? Hey, no,” Stark interjects, trying to recover and failing miserably. “Hug me again, babe. Hug me harder, you know I love feeling your manly pecs pressed against my back.”

Steve takes another tiny step back, face still tight with guilt. Stark flinches again, minutely, and quickly turns back to Bucky. To hide the glitch.

“I was surprised, is all,” he says lightly, voice already forced back to its normal cadence. “I was all sucked into the techtastic-wet-dream workings of Mr. Roboto’s arm here and you—. Surprised me.”

Bucky can still hear the jackhammer thrum of Stark’s heart, can feel the sympathetic rush of ice-cold adrenaline in own veins. He knows Steve can hear it, too.

“Hey, you wanna hang out for a while?” Stark continues, still stoically aloof. “Pitch in on the sell? I’m trying to convince Barnes to let me paint the thing hot-rod red.”

“No—no, that’s okay.” Steve is already backing away, heading toward the exit, sick remorse painted over every line of his body now. “I’ll just—get out of your hair. Leave you to it.”

Stark’s shoulders hunch inward at his words, like a bulwark.

“I’m sorry,” Steve says again when he’s at the door. Stark doesn’t answer, and Steve leaves, silent and miserable.

Stark doesn’t talk anymore as he finishes his work on the arm. His fingers move in a quick, economical flow over the wires and screws. All the easy sociability from before is gone.

Bucky tries to think of something to say—something casual, commiserate, but he doesn’t have the guy’s knack. His own words always get stuck somewhere right behind his throat, enmired in a thick tangle of anxiety whenever he needs them most.

And anyway, Stark’s face is closed off to him now, shuttered, turned inwards. The same way it had been for Steve.

Stark gives him a final, dismissive pat on the upper shoulder plate when he’s done, and immediately turns away. Bucky gets up to leave. The silence is starting to feel oppressive. God only knows how Stark feels.

He’s almost out the door, almost safely away, when his feet come to a stop on their own. He should just keep going, he should leave it the fuck alone. But, Bucky remembers the flash of terror in Stark’s eyes. The way it had lasted a half a second too long, even after Stark had turned all the way around, even after he’d seen Steve.

Bucky looks back. Stark is still faced away; he’s braced himself against the workbench, back hunched and head down.

“One of them was blond, huh?”

Stark swivels around to face him.

“I’m not afraid of him.” His voice is hard, angry. Bucky watches him, steady, until Stark jerks his eyes away. He crosses his arms tight against his body, defensive. “Get the fuck out of here, Barnes.”

Bucky leaves.

 

* * *

 

He tries again for sleep that night.

He makes himself stay in bed despite the close, claustrophobic press of air around him. Despite the irrational fear that the safe dim of his room is suddenly going to explode into blinding light. He tosses and turns for a long time, maybe even drifts off a few times.

But it’s no use; his mind won’t quiet down, his body is too on edge. It jolts him back to full awareness every time he starts to doze off, no mercy, heart racing and sweat sheening on his skin. Not even enough time to let the nightmares set in.

Bucky gives up sometime after midnight, goes down to the common floor and situates himself on the couch. He stares at the familiar lights of the city nightscape and thinks about nothing.

He doesn’t wait for Stark. He doesn’t keep an ear out for the soft ding of the elevator, the heavy trudge of footsteps plodding up from the workshop.

That turns out to be a good thing, because Stark doesn’t show. Bucky sits in silence, tracks the gradual shift of light outside the window: purple, then pink, then bright cloudless blue.

No nightmares tonight. No sleep at all.

 

* * *

 

“You didn’t ask. About—the first time around,” is how Stark starts the next night. He doesn’t mention Steve, doesn’t bring up what had happened before. Bucky doesn’t, either.

Stark looks even more tired than usual. Maybe this is the first time he’s been out of the workshop since Bucky left him there over a day ago.

He reaches to grab his own glass, tilts his head back to down the drink—because why the fuck not. Bucky’s system will filter out the alcohol long before it hits his bloodstream, but it still feels good going down. Hot, like fire licking through his chest. It’s nice to feel something on the inside.

“What makes you think I want to know?”

“Fuck you, Barnes. I’m gonna tell you anyway. You know me, I live for the limelight.” Stark pauses, adds more quietly, “If you don’t want to hear it, you can leave.”

Bucky stays.

“It wasn’t—what did you call it? Secondary function. It wasn’t that, the first time around. It was the point, then.” He drops his voice low, like an admission. “Hurting me, I mean. They wanted to hurt me. To—to scare me, until I gave them what they wanted.” Stark’s eyes are focused on the glittering nightscape outside the floor-to-ceiling windows opposite the couch. “It worked.”

“It usually does,” Bucky tells him.

Stark is sitting next to him again tonight. He’s been edging closer every night, but slow, as if he expects Bucky to shy away. He could have saved himself the trouble—it takes a hell of a lot more than proximity to make Bucky run.

“Usually?” Stark asks, conversationally. “Not always?”

Bucky shrugs. “Depends on how much practice you’ve had, I guess.”

“Yeah, I figure you’ve had plenty of that.”

Bucky thinks about the number of dicks that have been forced into him over his lifetime. He’s probably a contender for the world record, if not the winner. Though he’s had the advantage seventy years on the ice. “Yeah,” he says, “plenty.”

Stark pauses, casual, unassuming. When Bucky doesn’t elaborate, he goes back to talking about himself. It’s typical, and weirdly comforting. Comfortable.

“I was an idiot back then.” His tone is light again. “A kid, you know? A stupid kid, though I was pushing forty. I didn’t know anything about anything. Yinsen taught me that.” Stark takes a sip of his drink, slow, remembering. “He was another prisoner. A scientist. He didn’t—he didn’t make it.”

“And you did.”

Stark goes still a for a second, then smiles a little, lopsided. It doesn’t reach his eyes. “Yeah, I made it. For whatever the fuck that’s worth.”

Bucky waits while Stark takes another drink and wipes at his mouth with the back of a hand. It’s nice—a vicarious thrill—to listen to Stark say the same words that are constantly clawing at the back of his own throat, always trying to escape and always getting blocked.

“Anyway, he opened my eyes, taught me how much I didn’t know, Yinsen did. And—them. They taught me too.”

“Order through pain,” Bucky intones, and toasts Stark with his empty glass. He thinks about all the lessons that had been carved into his body, burned into his flesh.

Stark grins at him and clinks his tumbler against Bucky’s, hard enough to make his drink slosh over the sides onto Bucky’s fingers. For a second, the liquor burns like ice over his skin.

“Pain, yeah, lots of that,” Stark agrees. “I don’t remember all of it. There was this thing they did—with water. This rusty old tub. Got to the point where I couldn’t even look at it without wanting to piss myself. I—Jesus, I still can’t take baths.”

Stark’s voice trails off, lost in thought. Then he looks up and waves his hand again in that familiar, dismissive gesture. “And, you know, lots of run-of-the-mill beatings. They made sure I got those pretty regular, of course.”

“Of course,” Bucky echoes. He feels the unyielding metal of stun batons landing on his back, feels the sizzle of electricity across his skin.

He comes back to himself with the prickling sensation of Stark’s eyes on him, waiting. But not—pushing. Stark doesn’t prod, he doesn’t poke. When Bucky doesn’t say anything more, he goes back to staring down into his drink. Intent, like a diviner.

After a while, Stark starts talking again. His voice is distant now, in a way it hadn’t been before. The glass is shaking in his hand, but he doesn’t try to put it down.

“The other stuff—they had a room for it. If you can call it that. It was, I don’t know, another alcove in the cave or whatever. I think it used to be a junk closet or something, where they stored trash and old machinery they were too lazy to haul outside.”

Stark looks up. “They made us haul stuff, sometimes. Or—mostly Yinsen, actually. My hands were usually full with the battery. The car battery, attached to the thing in my chest. They made me carry it myself whenever I left the lab.” He rubs at his chest again, absently, then pulls his hand away to study his fingers.

The silence stretches for a moment, and Bucky pictures Stark with the bulky battery clutched to his body. Sees him being shoved out of the dark of the cave, stumbling and squinting at the sudden desert brightness. He thinks about what it must have felt like for Stark, having to carry around the implement of his own mutilation.

It doesn’t take much of a stretch of imagination: Bucky knows exactly what it’s like to have to own a thing forced onto his body, into it, fused inextricably with his own flesh. He’s suddenly uncomfortably aware of the ambient, mechanical hum of the arm, the soft whirring of servos as it shifts in tune with the rest of him.

Bucky has to put his glass down before the metal fingers shatter it.

“I had all these little burns on my hands, from the acid,” Stark is saying now, slow, almost like he’s talking to himself. “The thing was old; it leaked. It was terrifying—I kept imagining the acid would climb up through the wires and into my chest. I had these vivid images of it flowing into me, my heart pumping acid through my body.”

“Searing you from the inside out,” Bucky hears himself say. He wonders what that would feel like, tries to imagine acid flowing through his veins, into his capillaries. His mind turns the heat to freeze; crystals spidering through his insides like spreading frost.

“Ice burns, too,” Bucky admits. “Just like fire. Your nerves can’t tell the difference.”

“Some like it cold, some like it hot.”

“It was outside in, for me,” Bucky continues, without really meaning to. “The freeze would hit my skin first, make it—tight. Brittle. Then it would sink into my muscles, an inch at a time. I could feel the vessels expand as my blood froze inside them. I could feel the second my heart stopped. It always happened a few seconds before the ice reached my brain. I felt myself die, every time.”

Something brushes the back of his fingers, warm against his chilled skin.

The touch jolts him back into the present, and Stark withdraws his hand. Bucky realizes he’s got his arms wrapped around himself against the nonexistent cold. As if that would help. As if it ever helped.

The metal fingers are digging into his side. Bucky registers pain, extricates the fingers with another soft whir of servos. Stark pretends not to notice.

They sit in silence for a long while. Bucky starts to drift, body heavy and mind light, relaxed in a way that feels alien, unfamiliar. Unallowed. He’s almost out when Stark’s low, discordant voice floats over to him.

“Did you know that natural blondes are a genetic anomaly these days?”

At first, the words to don’t make sense. Bucky blinks open his eyes, slow. Stark is slumped next to him; he’s still got his eyes closed. “Less than two percent of the adult male population. I looked it up.”

Bucky waits.

“It was the same guy—the first guy, the one that had the crush on me,” Stark tells him. “Everybody’s all-American. Blonde hair, blue eyes, midwestern twang and all.” He looks over at Bucky, smiles a little, rueful, bitter.

“No bottle for that guy,” he explains. “He was all natural all the way down.”

Stark doesn’t say anything more, and Bucky drops his head back on the cushions, closes his eyes. He sees a face: familiar, friendly and—terrifying, all muddled together. He can feel the jittery hum of his own heartbeat, too loud, too fast.

It takes a long few seconds before Bucky can re-focus on Stark’s unassuming presence next to him. He’s here, nowhere else. There’s no one else. Bucky breathes, careful, controlled.

After a while, he’s not aware of anything.

 

* * *

 

When he opens his eyes again, the inky sky is starting to turn purple with dawn. Bucky feels more rested than he has in a long time.

Stark is still sprawled next to him on the couch, his breathing slow, steady, his body loose with sleep.

No nightmares for him either, tonight.

 

* * *

 

Bucky’s on his way up from another workout when it happens.

The elevator has just arrived at the common floor and he hears muffled, angry voices filter through the metal doors before the car comes to a full stop. They’re angry. Steve is angry.

Bucky jerks forward to hit another button—but it’s too late, the doors are already sliding open and he can see them in the kitchen. His eyes zero in on Steve’s face. It’s tight with displeasure. Something cold and fluttery churns in Bucky’s gut at the sight.

“—don’t know what you want from me!” Stark is saying, his voice almost cracking. “I’ve already told you every grisly detail I can remember, you want me to go back over it for ambiance? Why can’t you get past it already, I fucking have.”

“But you’re not past it! It’s pretty glaringly obvious that you’re not past it, and that’s fine! No one expects you to be okay with everything, you’ve only been back for a few weeks—” Steve stops, draws back a little. He’s facing out toward the room, and Bucky can see him struggling to get ahold of himself. When he speaks again, his voice is softer, pleading. “I wish you’d let me help you.”

Bucky tries to make himself look away. He needs to leave.

“Fine. I told you how you can help, you’re the one who keeps backing off. C’mon, let’s go back to the room and you can help me six ways from Sunday. I’m ready to go right now, babe. Show me what you got.”

“God, Tony, this is exactly what I’m talking about.” Steve pushes back, braces himself against the sink behind him. He looks furious. “Every time I think you’re going to—” Steve glances up just then and cuts himself off, catching sight of Bucky vacillating at the doors.

“Well excuse me for wanting to suck my lover’s cock, what the fuck was I thinking, huh?” Stark swivels around before Steve can respond. He freezes for a second when he sees Bucky, but then launches himself forward anyway, toward the elevator. Away from Steve.

“Tony, you can’t just—” Steve tries, taking an abortive step toward them, but Stark ignores him. He shoulders past Bucky and into the car.

“Shit or get off the pot, Barnes.” Stark doesn’t look at him. He hits the button for his workshop.

Bucky gets out.

Steve is still standing behind the counter. He’s got his arms crossed across his chest, head down.

Bucky hesitates in front of the elevator doors. The common area is open plan, and he can’t slink unobtrusively to the stairs now without walking past Steve. He’s about to make an attempt, anyway, when—

“Sorry, Buck.” Steve’s still looking at the floor. “You keep getting thrown in the middle of this. It’s not fair.”

Bucky breathes out, slow. This is Steve. This whole thing is as hard on him as it is on Stark, though he’d never admit it—could never even begin to understand it that way.

Bucky makes his way to the kitchen island, settles himself on a stool.

He wishes it came as easy to him as it did back in the day, when he always knew what to say, what to do to pick Steve up off the ground after yet another lost (hopeless) battle. A hand on the shoulder, an easy smile, a joke to smooth things over and wipe the bruises out from under his best friend’s eyes.

“It’s not up to you to fix everything,” Bucky manages, finally. It’s—difficult. Scary. He thinks for a second and makes himself go on. “Maybe it shouldn’t be, anyway. Maybe you can’t.”

Steve’s eyes snap up, shocked and—hurt. Bucky has to look away.

They sit in silence for a long while. Bucky is starting to wish he’d kept his mouth shut, when, “I know. I know that, Buck.” Steve’s voice is quiet. “It’s just—I don’t know what to do. He won’t let me close. He gets upset if I try to give him space. He won’t talk to me.” Steve looks up, jerks his chin in a quick, frustrated negation as if Bucky was about to contradict him. “He talks _at_ me; he doesn’t actually say anything.”

There’s a sharp clench in Bucky’s gut; he doesn’t know how to respond to that. He thinks of all the things he’s wanted to say to Steve since he’s been back—all the memories he’s wanted to share, all the joy, all the pain. All the words that get bottled up in his throat, itching for release and always getting stuck.

“I’m sorry,” Steve repeats, sounding worried now. “I didn’t mean—” and that’s when Bucky realizes the metal hand is wrapped around the edge of the counter, clenching to just this side of cracking the stone. Steve sinks back into guilty silence as Bucky disengages the fingers, curls his hands safely on his lap.

“It’s fine,” he says.

But Steve doesn’t look mollified. He’s heard enough reports from Bucky’s doctors, has sat in stiff support with him through too many terrible (terrifying) therapy sessions. He knows Bucky can’t handle invasions into the mess of his mind, no matter how well-intentioned, no matter how hard he tries to share.

Steve sighs, his big shoulders rounding in misery. Bucky searches again for words, but everything’s too jumbled inside his head, or stuck in the bottleneck of his gullet. Nothing ever works the way it’s supposed to. Not anymore.

“Tony’s a talker,” Steve rescues him. “He needs to talk; he needs to let it out. And I understand if—,” Steve’s voice drops a little, stoic, miserable, “if can’t talk to _me_ about it, I get that. But he won’t talk to anyone, not his doctors, or—”

“He talks to me,” Bucky interjects. He feels just as stunned as Steve looks.

“What?” Then, “Why would he talk to _you_?”

The blood flows up the back of Bucky’s neck, hot and uncomfortable. He thinks of Stark’s face, slack and still with sleep in the dim light of the common room at unholy hours of the night, curled up against Bucky’s side. When he should be in his own bed. With Steve. The image brings a rush of sticky guilt, and the guilt makes him angry.

“Back off, pal. I didn’t know you owned him.” Bucky aims the words at his own curled fists. They come out sounding shitty and belligerent, because that’s how he feels.

“Jesus,” says Steve, immediately repentant. “I’m sorry. Of course, he can talk to you. That’s not what I meant.” Bucky looks up in time to catch Steve look away. “I’m—glad,” he says. “That he’s talking to someone.” _Even if it’s not me_ , Steve doesn’t add, but Bucky can hear it echoing in the empty space behind his words. Bucky takes a breath and relaxes his hands, presses his palms flat onto his thighs under the counter.

When he looks up again, Steve’s forehead is furrowed, his mouth a tight line of unhappiness.

Bucky can’t figure out what to say next, as usual. After a beat, Steve continues, his voice softer now. “I _am_ glad, really. But I just wish—. I mean, I wish it didn’t have to be you. You’ve got enough to deal with. You don’t need this piled on, on top of everything.”

“It’s not like that.” Steve looks up at his words, surprised.

Bucky focuses on his hands again and visualizes a tunnel, a pipeline inside his throat. Enough to let the words out, if only one at a time. “I mean, yeah, Stark’s a talker,” he says. “He feeds on the sound of his own voice the way other guys feed on pizza and beer. Sometimes it’s bullshit, sometimes it’s not. He wants to talk to me—it’s fine. I don’t mind.”

“Thanks, Buck. Thank you. I know it’s not—”

“Wait,” Bucky cuts in, “let me finish.” It comes out kind of strangled. Steve snaps his mouth shut.

A tunnel. An escape route, he thinks. “Stark’s a talker,” he repeats, slowly. “But—he listens, too.” Bucky lifts his eyes. He hopes it’s enough.

“I’m glad,” Steve says, finally. He looks like he wants to say more, to ask more. Bucky waits, and the guilt builds again, slick and icy in his belly.

After a minute, Steve squares his shoulders. Bucky watches him swallow his words.

 

* * *

 

“Anyway, they made Yinsen haul stuff out of that room, too,” Stark starts, without preamble.

They’d been sitting in comfortable silence for a few minutes. It’s just after two in the morning, and Stark had already been at his spot on the couch by the time Bucky came in. It feels a little warmer in here tonight, though maybe Bucky’s imagining it.

“The junk room?”

“Yeah,” Stark confirms. “To—clear a space, you know. On the floor.” He pauses for a second. “I wish they’d given him a broom while they were at it.”

Bucky can picture the room: rock walls and a hard dirt floor, boxes and rusting machinery pushed against the walls. A space cleared at the center, enough room for two or three men in close proximity. He can feel the musty air against his skin, the dank, earthy smell clogging his nostrils, cut with the acrid tang of acid and machine oil.

“I did fight them at first.” Stark sounds—almost defensive now. Like Bucky’s going to call him out on a lie, or something. When Bucky glances up to meet his eyes, Stark drops his gaze. “Not that it made much of difference,” he admits. “They liked it, I think.”

“‘No fun fucking it when it just lies there like a corpse,’” Bucky remembers.

It’s not until Stark agrees, lightly, “Yeah, no fun at all,” that Bucky realizes he’d spoken out loud. There’s something about Stark that—unexpectedly, illogically—makes the words flow in a way they never do with anyone else. Bucky draws back a little, wary. But Stark just rubs at his face some more, then reaches out to pour them each a drink out of a dark red bottle.

Bucky takes a sip—it’s vodka tonight, for a change. Stark doesn’t touch his own drink.

“Anyway, the fight went out of me pretty quick,” he continues, shifting the focus back to himself. Bucky relaxes. “I was scared they’d hurt Yinsen if I gave them too much trouble,” he explains. “I was scared they’d hurt me, more. I was just—scared.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything. What’s there to say? Fear cuts sharper than knives, pierces deeper than bullets. It sinks through the skin and bleeds into the flesh, melds onto the core until nothing can wash it off, nothing can flush it out.

“It’s strange, you know?” Stark’s voice is contemplative now. “The things you remember, the things you don’t. I can’t remember what it felt like when they were fucking me.” He’s looking into the distance again, out over the New York City nightscape.

“I remember the pain, sure,” he goes on. “I remember feeling afraid. Ashamed. Then, later, I remember lying on the gurney, letting the medics poke at me in places no man likes to be poked in a non-romantic way.” He shoots Bucky another sharp grin before looking away again. “I remember the hours I spent sitting on those stupid plastic chairs, filling out forms about my sexual history. Waiting for the test results to come back.”

Bucky nods. He hates waiting. He’s spent half his life waiting: waiting for orders, for debriefings, for handlers to finish fucking him. Waiting to kill, or die. Waiting to live.

“But the important parts,” Stark is saying now, “you know, the awful shit you’d think you’d remember. That you’d never be able to forget. It’s—it’s just not there.”

Stark falls quiet again. Bucky watches as he reaches out with a finger to trace an old watermark left by a careless glass: a perfect ring.

“Anyway, Yinsen cleared the room like they told him to, but he didn’t sweep out the floor. Maybe he didn’t have a broom, or he just didn’t think to.” Stark pulls his hand back and brushes at his palm with the thumb of his other hand, like he’s trying to rub something off his skin.

“It’s strange, right?” he continues, his voice almost light again. “The things you remember. Because here’s the thing that sticks with me the most: the ground was covered with gravel, and, I don’t know, other trash. Little pieces of metal and broken glass, maybe. They’d push me down, and the stuff would scrape at my skin like a fucking cheese grater in time with their—with what they were doing. My hands, my elbows, my shins, all scraped raw.”

Bucky remembers concrete under his knees. He remembers the crick in his neck from sitting in the chair too long; the hours he’d wait, bored out of his mind, while the techs fiddled with controls and code to configure the wipe just right. He remembers blue eyes, an ice-cold smile, familiar, fond. He remembers fearing it as much as he longed for it.

“And the _sand_ , god. The sand was everywhere, it would get into my clothes, my mouth, my—.” Stark cuts himself off, is silent for another long moment before going on. “Sand sticks to blood like glue, did you know that? I was washing that shit of out of my cuts for weeks afterward. Who knows, some of it might still be under my skin.”

Stark is rubbing at his wrists again. Bucky reaches out with his flesh hand to stop him, and Stark goes immediately still at the contact. He looks up, meets Bucky’s eyes, but his gaze is still distant.

He says, “So they’re fucking me, and it hurts, and I’m hating them, and I’m hating myself for letting them do that me. But most of all, I’m hating _Yinsen_ for not sweeping the fucking floor.”

Bucky lets out a low breath. “Every little hurt counts, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Stark echoes softly. Then louder, “Yeah, it sure does.”

Stark shakes his head, comes back from wherever he’d gone. Somewhere dark and hot with dry desert air, Bucky’s willing to bet. He rubs a hand over his eyes, tired. When Stark speaks again, he sounds more present. “Anyway, it wasn’t like that this time around. These guys weren’t trying to hurt me. They didn’t care enough to.”

Secondary function. Bucky doesn’t bother saying it out loud, this time. He thinks about tac gear with easy-access pockets, and about standing orders. The silence stretches for a long minute, and it takes awhile for the words to make sense when Stark starts talking again.

“It’s just—plastic bags, every time,” he’s saying. “That’s what kills me. From diners and stuff, I guess? Pizza and mac and cheese and curry. Would it have killed them to bring me some Burger King, for once? At least their stuff comes in paper bags.” Stark pauses again, thinking. “Though maybe I should be glad they didn’t mess with the program.”

Bucky shrugs, noncommittally.

“The drug store bags were plastic too,” Stark continues after a while. “Condoms, the first time. And lube, after I asked for it.” His voice drops, wonderingly. “I _asked_ for it.”

“I never had to ask for it,” Bucky admits. “Couldn’t have me fucking up a mission because I was too fucked out.” He remembers the little foil packets, sterile, utilitarian, that they always kept stocked in the Soldier’s pockets. Military issue, for off-duty recreational purposes. Like him.

When he glances up, Stark is looking back at him. Waiting for him to say more. Bucky doesn’t have anything more to say.

“The thing is,” Stark says, after it’s clear Bucky’s done, “the thing is, now it’s all fucked up in my head.” He makes a face, dark, disgusted. “I can’t even order carryout because every time I hear a bag crinkle I can feel the gravel scraping on my palms.” Stark pauses to pour himself another drink. He tops off Bucky’s glass, while he’s at it.

 _I can’t look at Steve without feeling sand sticking to my skin_ , he doesn’t say, but the thought is clear enough in his eyes. Bucky remembers blond hair, blue eyes, soft hands and a cold smile. He thinks about the smooth, patrician voice that ordered him to hurt, to kill, to lay back and spread his legs for a more perfect world.

“I hate light switches,” Bucky admits, finally.

Stark fall silent for a second. “Because of the electricity?”

His voice isn’t weighted with pity or worry, the way a question like that usually is when it’s directed at Bucky. This is why he likes Stark, Bucky suddenly realizes: Stark’s constant, unapologetic curiosity about the way things—or people—tick, always outweighs any social qualms. It’s calming, somehow, and—liberating.

“No. It’s the actual switch I hate,” Bucky explains. “Coming out of the dark.”

It’s not that Bucky particularly likes the dark. He doesn’t hate the light, either. It’s the transition—the sudden shift from dark to light at the flick of a switch—that sends a bolt of adrenaline through him every time.

It’s coming out from the safe void of the cryo chamber and into an awareness full of pain and fear and blood.

“Yeah, that’s pretty fucked up,” Stark concedes. Then, “At least you’re not flinching whenever someone brings in groceries, though.”

Bucky looks over at him. “Yeah, you win.”

“Fuck you, Barnes,” Stark says casually, and takes another sip of his drink.

Bucky thinks about all the things that make him flinch. It’s almost easier to list the things that don’t.

“Anyway, it’s all mixed up in my head,” Stark is saying now, “and it’s getting even more mixed up the longer this thing drags on. It’s like—I’m psyching myself out, and his tiptoeing around me sure as fuck isn’t helping matters. I need him to fuck me. Fuck, I just need a good _fuck_ and everything would be okay.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it’s supposed to work.” It seems like the kind of thing he’s supposed to say.

“Don’t give me that bullshit, Barnes,” Stark retorts. “You were doing so well so far. I know how it works. I know how _I_ work. I—it’s how it worked the last time.”

“Yeah, I can see just how well it worked.”

“Fuck you,” Stark says again, then more softly, “fuck it, fuck me.”

His voice is loose, almost starting to slur again. He lets his head fall back and his grip slackens a little around the glass he’s holding. The silence stretches again, and Bucky thinks he’s probably fallen asleep.

Bucky pulls the tumbler out of Stark’s hands and puts it on the table. He’s trying to decide whether it’s worth it to wake the guy up, get him to settle into a more comfortable position, when, “Will you?”

Stark’s voice is quiet; he still hasn’t opened his eyes.

“What?”

There’s no reply right away. Bucky watches as Stark lifts his hand, slow, watches as it comes to rest on his own leg. It’s cool, from holding the chilled glass for so long.

“Maybe it doesn’t have to be him, you know? I just need to get it out of my system. And I know you won’t hurt me.” Stark swallows. “Will you?”

Bucky looks at the hand on his thigh, wonders what Stark would be like in bed. He’s probably a talker, the kind that makes a lot of noise.

Or maybe he’d be different: more like the way he is with Bucky on nights like this. Quieter and more—intense. When he glances up again, Stark is watching him, carefully.

“I’m not going to fuck you, Stark.”

“Yeah,” Stark says, after a while. Bucky feels the almost imperceptible shift as the body next to him relaxes, one increment at a time. Finally, Stark is loose enough that he’s almost brushing against Bucky’s side.

“Yeah,” he repeats. Then, “Thanks.” He doesn’t say anything more.

 

* * *

 

It’s still dark out when Bucky opens his eyes. He’s slumped back over the armrest of the couch. Stark is draped bonelessly over him, his head tucked into the crook of Bucky’s neck and shoulder. They can’t have been asleep for long, but Bucky feels refreshed. Stark’s warm weight over him is strangely, shockingly comfortable.

Bucky shifts, and Stark mumbles a wordless complaint, nuzzling closer into Bucky’s neck. Then he stiffens. After a second, Stark pulls away, disentangling his limbs until he’s sitting up at the center of the couch. He slides his hips forward until he’s not on Bucky’s lap anymore. He blinks down. Bucky looks back up at him.

“If we’re going to keep doing this, we should move to a bed. This couch isn’t doing much for my back.”

“Your back wasn’t exactly on the couch,” Bucky points out.

Stark turns away, rubs the sleep out of his eyes. He looks as well-rested as Bucky feels. And just as guilty about it. He glances toward the elevator that leads up to the penthouse.

“Still,” he says, after a while. “We really shouldn’t be—doing this.”

Bucky nods, slow. He pushes himself up, pulls his legs away from Stark.

“No,” he agrees.

 

* * *

 

It’s still dark by the time Bucky makes his way to his own suite. They’d only been asleep for a few hours, not enough time for dawn to seep in through the uncovered windows of his bedroom. Bucky braces himself, says, “JARVIS, lights.”

Nothing happens, and Bucky looks around for a manual switch he’s never had to use before. Before he can find it, the room starts to brighten, slowly.

It takes a full ninety seconds for the lights to ease on all the way.

 

* * *

 

Bucky spoons a ladleful of sauce on the pasta, pushes the plate over the counter. Clint catches it before it slides off the edge of the marble, and Stark tosses him some silverware.

“This is _good_ ,” Clint says, a couple bites in, eyes widening with surprise as he shoves another forkful into his mouth. It’s kind of insulting.

“I know, right?” Stark is standing next to Bucky, leaning back against the sink, arms crossed across his chest. He looks smug, as if he’d been the one to cook up the scratch-made marinara, instead of just standing around adding useless commentary and generally being in the way of everything Bucky was trying to reach for. “Robocop is full of hidden talents.” He waggles his eyebrows, and nudges sideways at Bucky with his hip.

It makes sauce from the ladle splatter across the front of Bucky’s shirt, probably staining it forever.

“Hey, I can do things,” Bucky says, throwing Stark an irritated look. He reaches for a kitchen towel. “I was in Italy for almost a year, back in the eighties. I learned from an expert chef.” No need to add that he was on an undercover mission, and that he had to execute his teacher-slash-lover after he’d extracted all the necessary intel.

“Then why the hell have we been eating Steve’s overcooked steaks and boiled potatoes all this time?” Clint’s voice is muffled behind a mouthful of food. “You’ve been holding out on us, man.”

“It was delicious,” Natasha says, wrinkling her nose at Clint. “Thank you for cooking.” She’s sitting at the counter a few seats down; she’s already finished her own plate. She’d been watching Bucky at the stove—and Stark, next to him—as she ate, delicate bites of pasta twirled around her fork, not a drop of sauce on her lips.

Bucky wipes halfheartedly at the marinara on his shirt with the towel; it doesn’t do much except widen the smear across his chest.

“I’m going to take some down to Bruce,” Natasha says. “He’s been in the lab all day. I’m sure he’s forgotten all about the concept of food by now.”

She stands and comes around the counter. Bucky puts the ladle down on the counter and automatically steps back to make room for her. She pauses at the edge of the island, waits while Stark moves to the other side of Bucky. Putting his body between them. Stark’s sidestepping is carefully casual, but Bucky sees the way Natasha notes their shift in position.

“I’ll come with you,” Clint says, after burping loudly and patting his stomach. “Nothing more entertaining than watching his fumbling attempts to flirt with you.” He grins, and Natasha rolls her eyes.

“He’s not going to flirt if you’re there gawking at us,” she says. “More’s the pity.” She heads toward the elevator with the plate full of food, and Clint trails after her.

They meet Steve in the hallway; it looks like he’s just getting back from a trip to the corner market. Bucky feels Stark stiffen next to him—at the sight Steve, or maybe at the grocery bags he’s carrying. After a second, Stark forces the tension out of his body and slaps on a smile. Bucky makes himself relax, too.

Steve doesn’t notice their sad little freak-out—he’s distracted by the pasta Natasha’s holding. “Yes, please,” he says, and Natasha laughs and twists to shield Bruce’s plate.

“Go get your own,” she says. “Bucky made enough for the village.”

Steve looks up past her, sees them at the stove. “You cooked!” His voice is delighted. He comes over to settle himself on one of the counter stools. “Remember that stuff you used to make when we were sharing that apartment in Brooklyn? Jeez, what I wouldn’t give for a hot bowl of whatever that was.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, wincing a little at the memory. “My culinary skills have advanced past reheated tomato soup and burnt grilled cheese.” It was mostly all they could afford back then, and tasted like crap. Steve was never picky when it came to food, though. They couldn’t afford that, either. Bucky turns to make up a plate for him now, slopping on enough sauce to drown the pasta. Just the way he likes.

“Aww, you used to cook for my man like a good little housewife,” Stark is saying, batting his eyelids obnoxiously. “I can just see the sepia-toned kitchen and the canned Campbell’s now. You probably had a frilly apron and everything.”

Bucky reaches to put the plate down in front of Steve, then looks down at his ruined shirt again. “I didn’t _need_ an apron,” he accuses. “You weren’t around.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Stark scoffs, “blame me for being a klutz. You’re the one who’s supposed to have the poise and cat-like reflexes of a ninja.” He reaches out to rub at something at Bucky’s neck, just where his collar hits his throat. Bucky cranes his head back to see the spot of marinara that had smeared at the neckline of his shirt. “Here,” Stark says, and licks his thumb before rubbing it again at the spot, putting his other hand flat on Bucky’s chest to keep the fabric from moving. “Let me just—”

There’s a soft clink. It’s Steve’s fork dropping onto his plate.

Bucky snaps his eyes up in time to see Steve jerking his eyes back down to his plate. He’d been staring at them.

Bucky feels the second the atmosphere changes, feels the instant Stark becomes aware of what he’d been doing. Of what they’d been doing. Stark fingers suddenly feel uncomfortable—intimate—against the bare skin of his throat.

Stark yanks his hand away guiltily, tucks it under his arm.

“It’s fine,” Bucky says, a few seconds later. Just enough time for the awkwardness to really set in. “I should just go change my shirt.”

“Yeah,” Stark agrees, swallowing. He’s standing a good three feet away now, staring at what must be a really interesting spot on the countertop.

Bucky slides past him and moves out of the kitchen as fast as he can without actually running. The silence is deafening, behind him.

 

* * *

 

Stark doesn’t join him on the couch that night. Or the next, or the one after that.

It’s what they’d agreed on, Bucky reminds himself, as he listens to the soft whir of the elevator swishing past, a straight ride from the basement workshop to the penthouse. No furtive pit stops on the common floor—it’s better for both of them. For all of them.

They’ll figure out how to sleep again eventually, he tells himself, as he watches the shadows darken under Stark’s eyes, as he feels the dull ache of fatigue seeping into his own bones, heavier with each passing day. Sheer exhaustion will win out, eventually.

It always does, he reminds himself.

 

* * *

 

Stark cracks on the fourth night.

He slinks guiltily into the common room around two in the morning, drops heavily down next to Bucky. Bucky tries hard to push back the relief that floods his body as soon as Stark hits the couch.

Stark doesn’t say anything until he’s finished the usual ritual of pouring them each a drink of exorbitant liquor that neither of them will appreciate. Bucky waits until Stark has clanked the bottle down on the coffee table, then empties his glass down his throat. He doesn’t taste a thing, doesn’t even feel the heat go down this throat.

“He still won’t touch me,” Stark says, eventually. Bucky glances at him, sidelong. _No duh_ , he doesn’t bother to say. Stark’s mouth twists; he drops his gaze. “Or I dunno, maybe he will now. I stopped asking.”

Stark puts his glass down. When he speaks again, his voice is low. “It’s like—he was starting to develop a tick. You know? Now his face freezes every time I try to remind him that we are people who have sex together.” He sighs and settles back on the couch. “Or we used to be, anyway.”

It’s hard to think of Steve as a sexual being. Unwillingly, Bucky starts to imagine it—but he shuts down that line of thought, quick. It’s too weird.

“So I’m just saying—is this who we are now?” Stark is wondering out loud. “Who I am? A person who doesn’t have sex. A monk. Brother Tony. Two strikes and you’re out, that’s how it works?”

“I have sex.” It’s been a hell of a lot more than two strikes for Bucky.

“No, you don’t.”

That startles a snort out of Bucky, half offended and half impressed at Stark’s perception, his sledgehammer honesty. He lets his head fall back against the cushions.

“No, I don’t,” he concedes. He stares up at the ceiling for a second, considering. “But I think I will, someday. Probably.”

“Probably?” Stark sounds incredulous now. “And that doesn’t worry you, that ‘probably’? Probably, which means possibly not, which means maybe it’s not gonna happen, maybe you’ll never have sex again?”

Bucky shrugs. “What’s the rush? I’ve got the rest of my life to figure that out. Anyway, I have more pressing problems.” Dying of sleep deprivation, for one, or keeping his shameful little secrets under wraps—like hiding whatever the fuck he’s doing now with Stark, behind his best friend’s back. If HYDRA had taught him anything, it was the necessity of getting through one day at a time.

He looks over at Stark. “Do you even want to, really?”

“ _Yes,_ I want to have sex.” Bucky holds his gaze until, “Probably,” Stark amends, deflating. He wipes a hand over his face. “I just—I want to talk to him. Be with him. That much, I’m sure of.”

“So do it already,” Bucky says, tiredly. “What’s stopping you?”

“Fuck you, Barnes. What’s stopping _you_?”

Bucky looks away. He lets his head fall back on the cushions again, feels the familiar tightness in his throat.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Stark says.

Bucky pictures Steve’s blue eyes, his blond hair, his open face. _I’m with you_ , he says, _till the end of the line_. It’s too much, and not enough—Bucky’s not strong enough replace one image with the other, to overlay the latent dread that’s always lurking at the far edges of his hindbrain.

“Pierce had a midwestern twang.” The words come out sounding dull, flat, discolored by the sillage of soft hands, a cold smile. A voice that held everything, that could take everything away. “Back in the day. He talked like a movie star. Smooth. Looked like one too.” All the barriers are gone. Bucky’s throat feels _too_ bare, all of a sudden. Scraped raw.

“Everybody’s all-American,” Stark agrees, quietly.

“It’s almost— _fine_ , you know?” It comes out in a rush; Bucky can’t hold it back. He doesn’t want to. “I’m almost okay, most of the time. Then something happens. Or, I don’t know, nothing happens. A door closes, there’s a smell, there’s a shift in the light that highlights his hair just fucking so, and—it’s not okay anymore. I’m not okay anymore.” Bucky looks up. Stark is still slumped back on the couch, his hands clutched at his thighs.

“The guy didn’t even look like Steve, not really,” he says, finally. “Didn’t sound like him, sure as fuck didn’t act like him. It’s all fucked up.”

“We’re all fucked up,” Bucky agrees.

After a second, he reaches out and puts his own hand, the flesh one, over Stark’s. It takes a while, but eventually Stark relaxes his fingers, loosens his death-grip on his thigh. His skin is warm.

“I want to talk to him,” Stark says. “I want to _touch_ him; I want him to touch me. I’m used to it. Or, I used to be, anyway. It’s never been like this.” Stark twists his wrist until they’re palm-to-palm. Holding hands. “It wasn’t like this—before. I jumped right back on the bandwagon, that time.”

Stark’s eyes are distant, remembering. He’s still holding Bucky’s hand. “Some leggy redhead. A reporter, maybe.” Stark shakes his head, glances over. There’s a wry tilt to the corner of his mouth. “She fucked the crazy right out of me; didn’t even notice it. Or maybe she just didn’t care. She touched me all over—and after, I wasn’t afraid anymore.” He shrugs a little, a careless lift of one shoulder. “More or less.”

“More or less,” Bucky echoes. He thinks of the tight, jittery energy that surrounds Stark all the time these days. It hadn’t been like that—before. Stark was calmer. He had the lazy, uncoiled energy of a cat; he basked in everyone’s attention—in Steve’s attention—careless confidence emanating from some deep, solid place inside himself.

Bucky tries to imagine what Stark had been like before Steve. Something like this version of himself, maybe. Stretched taut, just to this side of snapping. He thinks about what he’s heard about Stark’s reputation—all the drinking, the impulsiveness, the casual flirting and fucking around—all the walls of distractions and defenses he threw up around himself. It’d be an easy habit to fall into. Anything to keep the crazy at bay.

Bucky hadn’t started falling apart, after all, until HYDRA stopped fucking with him. He can understand the allure of that kind of abandon. Even if he never had a chance to indulge in it, himself.

“Maybe that’s what helped—the touching.” Stark is saying now. He’s looking down at their joined hands. “Maybe that’s why you help, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Bucky echoes, after a beat. “Maybe that’s why.”

Touch is—nice, something he’s never really had before. It’s comforting. Bucky could get used to it. He shouldn’t get used to it.

A tendril of adrenaline scrapes at the back of his neck again, out of nowhere. His body stiffens, and Stark lets go of his hand. Bucky knows, he _knows_ , there’s no one here except the two of them—it’s too late, or too early; everyone sane is tucked safely in their beds for the night. But he has to scope out the exits again, anyway.

They’re clear. The air is still, the hallway leading to the elevators is empty. Just like he knew it would be. Stark is looking at him, wary. Bucky slumps back, wipes a hand over his face.

“You should go back to bed,” he says, tiredly. “You should talk to Steve. Tell him—all this. It’s what you want. It’s what he wants.”

“How am I supposed to tell him that I want him—that I’m not afraid of him—when I am?” Stark glances over again. His exhausted face is strained with an underlayer of disgust, of self-loathing. Bucky knows the feeling.

“Anyway, the flinching thing sure as fuck isn’t helping. I know Nat noticed it today, if she hadn’t already. It’s getting worse, maybe. I have to _brace_ myself to be around anyone.” Stark’s eyes are fixed at his hands again. They’re twisted together on his own lap now. “Anyone except you.”

“Yeah, you are pretty handsy with me.” Bucky thinks of Stark’s fingers on his collar, on his chest in the bright light of the kitchen. How he never shies away from Stark’s casual proximity anymore, the way he does with everyone else. He thinks about how he hadn’t even noticed the touch until he saw the shock in Steve’s eyes.

“And now there’s that added complication, on top every other fucking thing.” Stark slumps back on the couch again, runs a hand over his eyes. “He thinks we’re sleeping together.”

Bucky closes his eyes for a second. “Well, we are,” he says. “So there’s that.”

Stark looks over. “Are we?” Bucky hears the exhaustion in his voice, and the plea. Stark hasn’t slept, either, since the last time they’d been on the couch together; it’s obvious from the circles under his eyes, the tired slump of his shoulders. His body is already leaning in towards Bucky’s: an unconscious ask.

The image claws to the front of his brain again: Steve, lying on the huge bed upstairs. Alone. Bucky shoves it away; he can’t deal with it right now. Tomorrow, he promises. After he’s had some goddamn sleep. He takes a breath, then presses himself back against the armrest, arranging his limbs to make room for Stark.

“Yes,” he gives in, “we are.” The relief in his voice matches the look in Stark’s eyes. Guilty permission and shameful assent for something neither of them should want.

 _Just one more time_ , Bucky thinks, as he feels Stark settle on top of him.

His body relaxes immediately, a hundred unacknowledged tensions releasing under the familiar weight of Stark curling against him. One last time. Tomorrow, he’ll talk to Steve. Or convince Stark to talk to him. What they’re doing isn’t fair—it isn’t right. Steve would never betray either of them this way.

It’s the last thing Bucky remembers thinking, before sleep takes him.

 

* * *

 

There’s a change in the density of the air above him. Bucky wakes, instantly.

He keeps himself still, keeps his breathing even as he takes stock of his surroundings. He’s lying on the couch. Stark is still lying across him, body slack and head tucked under Bucky’s chin. Stark’s hand is curled loosely against Bucky’s collarbone, the side of his thumb just brushing at Bucky’s throat. Almost the exact same place he’d touched, unthinkingly, before.

“I know you’re awake,” Steve whispers. Bucky opens his eyes.

The stars are still high outside; it’s too early for Steve to be up for a run. He’s still in his pajama pants—he must have come searching for Stark.

His face is shadowed, the darkness of the room hiding his expression.

“Sorry,” he says, still quiet, “I didn’t mean to wake you.” Bucky watches, numbly, as Steve lowers himself carefully down on the edge of the coffee table. “I thought Tony might still be in the lab.” His voice is pitched too low to read.

Stark stirs a little at the sound, mumbles in his sleep and nestles closer. Bucky focuses hard on not stiffening or jerking away. Stark’s knee right is pulled up, drawn cozily around Bucky’s thigh. His shirt had ridden up while they were both asleep, and Bucky’s right arm is half wrapped around his torso. He can feel Stark’s soft, even breathing through the threadbare fabric of his t-shirt.

“This isn’t—.” Bucky stops, swallows.

 _This isn’t what it looks like_ , he’d started to say.

Except, it’s exactly what it looks like.

This is him sleeping with Steve’s lover, bodies pressed close and limbs curled intimately around each other.

There’s suddenly a gaping hollow where Bucky’s stomach is supposed to be.

That’s when Stark decides to wake up. “What?” he mumbles, rubbing his cheek against Bucky’s chest and burrowing his body a little closer, snug and mortifyingly familiar.

Then he opens his eyes. Bucky feels the instant he realizes they’re not alone. He feels the body against him go tight, rigid, between one breath and the next.

“Oh, hey,” Stark says, after a long beat, blinking. He turns his face toward Steve’s shadowed form; the shift presses his body a bit more into the nook between Bucky and the couch. It makes Bucky’s hand slide further up into his shirt. The bare skin of Stark’s back is warm, soft against his palm.

Bucky yanks his hand away, starts pushing himself away from Stark. There’s not much room to maneuver. “Get off me, Stark,” he says. His voice comes out hoarse.

Stark obeys without commentary, for once in his life. He disentangles his limbs and pulls himself up, movements wooden and eyes wary. It takes them an interminable few seconds to extricate themselves, during which the emptiness in Bucky’s gut grows, sick and viscous, until it’s slithering up his throat.

He tries to think of something to say, but by the time he’s sitting stiffly up on the couch, a safe foot away, the numb void has invaded his brain, clogged his speech. He waits for Stark to offer something—an explanation, an apology, a joke to diffuse the suffocating silence—but there’s nothing. Apparently, this is the exact shade of awful a situation needs to reach to shut even Stark up.

“You shouldn’t be sleeping here,” Steve says, finally breaking the silence. His face is still hidden in the shadows; impossible to gauge his expression. “There’s a big bed upstairs,” he says. “Several of them.”

Then Steve stands, laboriously, using the table to lever himself up. Like he needs the support.

“Come on.” He puts out a hand, but Stark just looks at him blankly for a few more seconds. The city lights from outside are throwing bright reflections on his eyes, making them glitter in the darkness, but the rest of his face is deathly still. Even in the dim light, Bucky can see the ashen cast to his skin.

He takes Steve’s hand, finally, pulls himself up. Steve lets go as soon as Stark is standing. He steps back, lets Stark move past him toward the elevator.

Stark’s movements are stiff, like he has to formulate every step before he takes it.

“C’mon Buck. You too.” Bucky yanks his eyes away, and up to Steve’s still-unreadable face. Steve doesn’t offer him a hand, just turns to make his way to the elevator behind Stark’s shuffling steps. Bucky stands on his own, and follows.

The close air in the elevator is oppressive. Steve hits the button for the penthouse, then turns to face the doors. It’s impossible to reach the controls past him—he’s blocking the buttons on purpose. Bucky’s skin feels tight, prickly. Glancing over at Stark’s stiff form next to him would be too much of a betrayal, even for him. He keeps his eyes fixed the solid wall of Steve’s back.

“Hey, listen—” Stark tries at some point, but Steve cuts him off.

“It’s fine.” His voice is brittle. Stark keeps his mouth shut, after that.

When they get to the penthouse, Steve heads straight for the bedroom without looking back. Stark trails behind him, still silent, and after a breath, so does Bucky. Steve wants to hash this out behind closed doors, where he can unload the full force of his hurt and anger in the privacy of his own bedroom. It makes sense.

Once they’re inside, Bucky keeps his gaze fixed on the floor. There’s nothing for him to say; nothing he can say. Steve stops at the edge of the bed, turns to look at them. The expensive sheets are thrown back, crumpled as if someone had been tossing restlessly on them for hours.

Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky sees Stark take a breath, open his mouth—

Steve beats him to it. “You guys can have the bed,” he says, brusque. Bucky snaps his eyes up. “I’ll take one of the guest rooms.”

“What—?” Stark’s face is pinched, eyebrows tenting with alarm.

Steve puts up a hand to stop him. “It’s fine,” he says again. His voice is even, but Bucky can hear the awful strain just behind the carefully controlled tone. Stark opens his mouth again, takes an abortive step forward, but, “I mean it’s not _fine_ , obviously,” Steve cuts him off, “but I understand. Really, I do.” His voice is low, agonizingly forthright. “You guys found—something to help. Found each other. I get that now.”

“Steve—”

“We can discuss the rest in the morning,” Steve interrupts again. “Right now we all just need some sleep. And anyway, the important thing is that you—. You have what you need.” He slides his gaze over to Bucky. “Both of you.”

“This isn’t— _this_ isn’t what we need,” Bucky blurts. His throat wants to close up again, but he forces the words out. A tunnel, he thinks, a pipeline. “It’s not—I shouldn’t have let any of this happen.”

“Don’t, Buck. This isn’t your fault. It’s not any of our faults. It’s HYDRA’s—,” Steve’s gaze slides back to Tony, “—and all those assholes who hurt you.” His voice drops, cracks a little at the end. “Those people that I couldn’t protect you from.”

“Steve _,_ ” Stark’s voice is wrecked. “Please, I’m sorry. I—”

“Tony, _don’t—_ don’t apologize. I’m sorry. _I’m_ sorry.” Steve’s tone is strained, miserable, “I heard you talking—about the guy. The guy with the blond hair.”

Stark’s skin turns gray, and Bucky’s throat closes like a vise. _He’d heard._ What had Steve heard?

A thousand things Bucky has tried to say, and couldn’t. A hundred betrayals laid on someone who didn’t deserve them. Shaky half-lies layered on crumbling secrets, all the times Bucky had flinched away from Steve’s open hand, his smile, all the times he’d let the past control him.

Steve is stepping back now, face crumpling, a torrent of words gushing out like he can’t hold them back a second longer, “And—Pierce. What you said about him, Buck, how he looked back in—. I heard that, too. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have been eavesdropping. I should have said something earlier. God, I should’ve _known_. I can’t believe I’ve been pushing myself on you—on both of you. I shouldn’t have ever—”

“ _No_ ,” Bucky says. His voice rings loud, harsh in the otherwise silent air. Steve snaps his mouth shut. Bucky takes a breath, lets it out. Stark is staring at him now, too.

This has to stop. He can’t do it any longer—he’s already done it for too long.

“You’re not him,” Bucky says.

“What? I—”

“Be quiet.” He makes himself meet Steve’s confused eyes, wills his gaze to hold, unwavering. “Tell me you’re not him.”

Bucky waits, watches as Steve swallows his question, his objections. “I’m not him,” Steve says, finally. His voice is low, steady. A promise, and an abnegation. Bucky looks at him carefully, the controlled tension across his powerful shoulders, the tilt of his chin, his hands, held painstakingly loose at his sides.

“I know,” Bucky tells him, and it’s true. “Now tell Tony.”

Blue eyes swivel to meet brown, wide and wary. Steve’s face is beautiful under the bewilderment. Movie-star good looks. “I’m not him,” repeats, obedient. Then, more softly, “Tony. I’m not—I’m not _him_.”

Tony flinches a bit, almost drawing back. But then he nods, slowly, his face unlocking.

After a second, he takes a step forward, and another. Steve holds himself perfectly still, waiting, until—

Tony reaches up, cups his palm around Steve’s smooth cheek. Steve’s breath rushes out in a shaky huff, his eyes closing, face turning to press into Tony’s touch. Bucky watches the muscles of Tony’s back unlock, one at a time, the tension releasing across his shoulders, then down the line of his spine. Bucky feels his own body loosen in response, the tightness ebbing away.

“You’re Steve,” Tony murmurs, finally. He’s still studying his lover’s face. “My Steve.”

Steve opens his eyes. They’re blue, and bright. The light catches on his hair, shining highlights of gold that contrast sharply against Tony’s darker features. It’s still mixed up, muddled with other images, other memories, another face that won’t go away. But—maybe it doesn’t have to.

Tony turns his head then, looks over. “Ours,” he amends. “Mine, and—Bucky’s.”

Steve follows his gaze, a slow smile warming his face. “Yes,” he says.

Tony shifts his touch Steve’s face, drawing his attention back. Bucky watches as he runs the pad of his thumb over Steve’s lower lip, tracing the shape of it. He slides his hand further down, slow, along the side of Steve’s neck, his collarbone. He stops when his palm is over the center of Steve’s chest, holding him there.

Then, “We’re still fucked up, though,” Tony confesses. His eyes are still fixed on his own hand. “It’s still—all fucked up. In our heads.”

“That’s okay,” Steve says, and moves his own hand over Tony’s, pressing it over his heart. After a second, he looks up past Tony, to where Bucky’s standing. “I told you,” Steve tells him, “it’s okay. It’ll be okay. We’ll figure it out, together.”

“Okay?” Tony says, and he’s watching Bucky too, now. Waiting, but not pushing.

“Yeah,” Bucky says. Then louder, “Yeah, okay.”

Steve steps back, puts out a careful hand. “Come to bed.”

Tony takes it, lets Steve draw him onto the crumpled sheets, lets him pull the covers over his legs. Then Steve sits on the edge of the bed, his hand still curled loosely over Tony’s knee over the blanket. He looks up.

“C’mon, Buck,” he says. “You too.”

 

* * *

 

The sheets are whisper-soft under his back. The bed is ridiculously wide, room enough for the three of them, and more. Bucky looks up at the high ceiling of the penthouse, waits as the lights dim, slowly. It takes a full ninety seconds for them to switch all the way off.

“Trust you to cut through the bullshit,” Tony whispers, and Bucky turns his head to look. Tony is curled against Steve’s side, smiling a little, his cheek squished against his lover’s chest. His eyes are glittering bright from the city lights shining in through the wall of windows on the far side of the bed. “I tried to,” Tony goes on, “a hundred times. Just—couldn’t figure it out. What I needed. What _we_ needed. You know?”

A hundred times, a thousand hurts. A million stars in the sky; but only one thing that matters. Bucky shifts to turn his body, curls himself around Steve’s other side. He puts his palm over Steve’s heart, feels Tony’s fingers twine around his own. They’re warm, and calloused, and achingly familiar.

Bucky meets his gaze, smiles back, just as soft. “Yeah,” he says, “I know.”

He doesn’t say anything more. He doesn’t need to.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I’m using this to fill the _Handcuffed/Bound Together_ box on my Trope bingo card. 
> 
> Story title is from the song _Laugh, I Nearly Died_ by The Rolling Stones.
> 
>  **All comments and kudos are cherished!** You can also discuss this story (or anything else) with me on [Imzy](https://www.imzy.com/kaesaria) or [Tumblr](http://kaesaria.tumblr.com/).
> 
> ... And if you made it this far, please consider filling out this super quick (seriously, only five multiple-choice questions long), TOTALLY ANONYMOUS [feedback survey](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeuf1F0POKEpNzpZGZnQWEBirBmlYpOvWZC8wkCMRGMW0gbPQ/viewform). 


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